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Rainbow IQ 320.25 install, reviews, and pics

A41.8QTM

That's what she said
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Car(s)
2008 GTI
What, exactly did you have to remove...the rubber ring on the door card?

you have to rip out a ring inside the door trim to fit properly the midbass with its included bracket


I'd also like to confirm that while the tweeter does has a plug for the stock wiring, it is too short to reach by about 1-2" :frown:
 

A41.8QTM

That's what she said
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Car(s)
2008 GTI
How the hell did you get those plastic rivets down inside the adapter ring and through the holes? I guess some long needle nose pliers would help. I might just get some more secure screws and backers anyway.

the small screws definitely did not work, i used my own set. i had very little faith in the plastic rivet replacements, however i am surprised that they are doing the job fairly well.
 

A41.8QTM

That's what she said
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Car(s)
2008 GTI
I've got some sort of electrical box mounted where you have that x-over in the middle of the door. Is that all related to the factory speakers and can be completely eliminated?

How I mounted my crossovers:
 

A41.8QTM

That's what she said
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Car(s)
2008 GTI
Okay folks...group effort here to help me at least bang out the passenger side today. Here's the deal so far. I spent an hour and $150 at Lowes picking up some screws earlier today :) FYI - I'm working with a 4-door so my doors are smaller then what lounginfreak247 posted just above.

I've I'm 99% sure the electric box I'm talking about is the factory x-over. All the wires running to the OEM speakers come from this box as well as 2 additional wires (input I assume) which are brown/blue and red/blue. Based on the wiring diagram for the Jetta the brown/blue is the negative input and red/blue is positive input (inputs we should be using into our x-overs...they are actually the output signal from the head unit). I was a bit confused looking at the wires inside the cabin going through the molex connector because there is no brown/blue or red/blue. The output wires from the stereo for the right front are brown/red (-) and brown/black (+) but for whatever reason the brilliant German engineers decided to change the colors on us when they pass through the Molex connector and enter the door.

My door after deadening last night...2am.


Here is the wiring in/out for the OEM x-over. This is the thing I was asking about where lounginfreak247 has one of the Rainbow x-overs mounted. Now that I know what it is I'll be removing it.


Tweeter


Mid


Woofer


This is the wiring inside the car going through the Molex connector into the door. Notice the brown/red and brown/black?
 

A41.8QTM

That's what she said
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Car(s)
2008 GTI
English please :) I understand DMM...but continuity?

Base on the wiring diagrams I'm pretty sure I've got it.
 

A41.8QTM

That's what she said
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Car(s)
2008 GTI
I have to be honest with you guys. The install in a 4dr is a lot of work trying to modify the inside of the door cards and playing with positioning to squeeze both X-over units in there. Plus, I had to remove the trim ring for the woofer from the inside of the door card to get sufficient clearance. And, I had to do some minor trimming of plastic to get the mid to sit flush against the mounting surface.

Plug and play...definitely not. Drop-in...nope. I sure hope the sound good.
 

A41.8QTM

That's what she said
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Car(s)
2008 GTI
Okay, last update for the night. I finally finished with the passenger side completely. It actually required a good bit of minor tweaking on the door panel and being creative with x-over placement to get it all to fit. I'm also pretty anal about stuff like this so it took me a long time to get all the wiring done. Luckily I have a comfortable garage to work in with a TV so I basically camped out on the floor all night.



Here's a pic with all of the wiring done. The x-overs are held in place with industrial Velcro. That came in handy for adjusting the position while I tried to find locations that let the door panel fit back on.



The covers to the x-overs have to stay off for clearance...it's that tight. Also, make sure to leave that little cup behind where the mid goes open. I originally had deadener over it but I found out it's actually there to give the mid enough clearance.

All connections are shrink-wrapped to keep things tidy and secure, then covered with the protective colored jackets.





Here's the woofer installed. I ditched the hardware that came with the set and picked up some more secure stuff at Lowes. I used speed nuts and 3/4" #8 screws to mount the plastic ring to the door and also ran a thin piece of weatherstrip between the door and the ring to get a nice seal. I used 1/2" #8 screws to mount the woofer to the ring (also with a layer of weatherstrip).



I had already spent way too much time working on just one door today but I didn't want to just slap the panel back on without giving it a bit of sound deadener to add some mass and hopefully avoid nasty resonance. I didn't spend a lot of time but hit most of the flat surfaces.



The only issue I have is that the door panel doesn't fit tight against the door on the lower outside corner. It's not hitting anything so the best I can figure is that the plastic clips aren't fully engaged but I've whacked it pretty good with no luck. I've got it all bolted back up for now. I'll see if I get any rattles or buzzing before I pull it apart and make an attempt to fix it.

So I've only listened for about 30 sec but honestly, it sounds stock, if that. I've got the mid set up +3db and the tweeter set to "reference". The woofer doesn't seem to have as much punch as the stock stuff in the driver side. Now keep in mind that I'm only using the power coming from my RNS 510 and haven't done any tweaking with the sound settings...or even given them a chance at all really. I was tired of living in the garage and really just wanted to make sure everything worked before shutting things down for the night. Hopefully I'll get the driver side done in the next few nights.
 

CoccoBill

Ready to race!
Location
Yurop
It's entirely possible that replacement drivers won't be as loud as the stock ones when powered with just the headunit. The 8" midbass has a sensitivity of 90dB which is not bad, but most likely lower than the stock set. If the stock element for example is 93dB, the 8" will need twice the power to reach the same volume. Also remember that speakers need to be driven in, the sound might change considerably after 100 hours of use.

Do you think any of the problems fitting the speakers are caused by the dampening in the doors, that is, do you think the installation would be easier for a "vanilla" door? That's about the only valid excuse I can think of, from your experiences they don't really seem that drop-in.
 

A41.8QTM

That's what she said
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Car(s)
2008 GTI
Monday morning update


After listening for 20min on the way to work today I have a totally different impression. The MB actually seems pretty punchy and overall the sound from the set is a bit louder compared to the driver side OEM speakers. I used the "reference" setting for the tweeter because in the past I've had to set my tweeters 3-6db down to address harshness or overly bright sound. I think, for me, these tweeters in this car could be set to the regular 0db level (forget what they call it). It's still tough to give a decent evaluation with one side of the car running OEM and the other with the Rainbows. I plan to spend the next few evenings working on the other side and hope to have it all dine in time for a road trip over the weekend.

On the fitting issues...the deadening may very well be the problem with the door panel not sitting completely flush on the back edge. There are several "supports" that contact the door and that layer of mat may be creating the gap. I still think at least one of the clips needs to be fixed. You'll see when you pull the panel off that the clips have an "open" position and a "compressed" position. I wasn't able to get a couple of them to stap into the "open" position before I put the panel back on. I'll take some pics of what I'm talking about tonight when I take the driver side door off.

As for the speaker fitment issues...the deadening has nothing to do with it. Here is a quick run-down of things I had to do (off the top of my head):

-tweeter fit right into the pod after breaking the OEM unit out and cleaning up a couple of plastic tabs. I used a bit of glue to secure the new tweeter just to be safe.

-mid fit mostly but you'll notice some small rivets on the back side of the mounting ring. Those come intocontact with a raised plastic ring on the door panel so you'll need to carve out some space with a sharp blade...very minor mods. Otherwise it mounted up fine.

-woofer - As I mentioned earlier, the hardware included is probably fine but I wanted something a bit more robust so I picked up $5 worth of #8 screws (1/2" and 3/4") and speed nuts at Lowes. The speed nuts slide over the the sheet metal but I needed to crimp the lip on the edge of the speaker hole slightly to keep the nuts from being forced open too wide. Everything then mounted up nice. When fitting the door panel back I the plastic and rubber ring that fit over the front of the stock woofer was contacting the new speaker so i had to pull it off the inside of the door panel. It was just held on with 4 melted plastic tabs and snapped off cleanly without and problems.

-there is definitely more room to work with inside the 2dr version so mounting the x-overs should be easier. I'm pretty sure I found the only 2 locations that will work in the 4dr and that even requires leaving the covers of the x-overs off for clearance. that shouldn't be an issue since the inside of the door is sealed off from the elements.

The new hardware for mounting the woofer and ring


Speed nuts in place


Ring mounted
 
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LoyalSage

Go Kart Champion
Location
California
Car(s)
MKIV & MKV R32
@A41.8QTM

Great job, very clean work from what I can see in the pictures. First of all I would like to thank you for documenting and driving discussion for future installers that may need the help.

Secondly I would like to say I am very jealous, your garage rocks! And thirdly I have a few suggestions for you: open your outer door skins, dampen the hell out of it, mount your X-Overs from the outside, you have so much space in there its not even funny, and there are plenty of places to route wire back and forth between the front and rear door spaces.

Great job overall, My install is seriously falling behind, I am leaving the country for almost three weeks, so I will not be able to provide any feedback until then.
 

Monkeykungfu

Go Kart Champion
Location
New Orleans, LA
Car(s)
2008 BMP GTI
Thanks for posting all of this up A41.8QTM. Great job on the install. I'm really interested to hear how the Rainbows will sound once they're properly amped. Do you have a rough estimate on when you might finish your build?

Thanks!
 

A41.8QTM

That's what she said
Location
Virginia Beach, VA
Car(s)
2008 GTI
I would like to get the door skins off and get a layer or two of material on them. I don't think I want to mount the x-overs out there though as it's pretty wet on that side judging by my feeling around through the woofer hole.

I plan to finish the speaker install this week. I have my LCi6 but haven't ordered an amp yet. I have been procrastinating on pickin gup a PDX5 while I fight with myself over always wanting something better then I really need. I think I'll just order the damn thing and be done with it. I can always change it out later if it makes me feel better. Probably be several weeks though before I find time for the install. I'm currently in the thick of traiing for an Ironman on June 21 so that, plus eating, sleeping, and work have me pretty booked up for a while.
 
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